GREELEY — For the first time in decades, residents of industry-friendly Greeley are fighting to keep oil and gas wells away from their homes.

A project approved by city planners would put 16 wells under the Fox Run neighborhood, with wellheads and tanks 350 feet from porches.

"They're not going to drill those wells. They're not going to poison me and my children," said Mark Schreibman, a resident and leader of the newly formed opposition group Greeley Communities United.

The tiny group is appealing to City Council. No one expects them to prevail.

Few cities along Colorado's Front Range have proved more receptive to the expansion of oil and gas drilling than Greeley. Mayor Tom Norton lobbied for looser state regulation of the industry, and Colorado case law limiting local power over drilling is rooted in Greeley.

But the resistance by Fox Run residents shows that even communities that have been gung-ho about boosting domestic energy production may feel pressure for greater protection as drilling reaches residents' fence lines.

Greeley, the Weld County seat, is surrounded by 20,128 wells. State data show the city's 47-square-mile limits remain relatively untapped.

There are 427 wells within Greeley, and oil and gas companies are moving ahead with plans to drill several hundred more. Long-term, the city anticipates 1,605 wells inside its growth area.

"I never imagined I'd have to worry about mineral rights and the potential for drilling right next to my home," said Ross Johnson, who grew up in Greeley and lives in the neighborhood with his wife and two preschool daughters. "I mean, we are in the city."

Greeley City Manager Roy Otto says the city embraces the notion of weaning the nation from foreign oil.

"The world needs energy, obviously," he said. "We'd like to be a part of figuring out how the resources can be developed to the fullest potential for the benefit of the world and ourselves."

Drilling brings thousands of jobs and $3.3 million in direct revenues to Greeley, Otto said.

It's a matter of balancing the interests of residents with industry rights, he said. "New people are coming to terms with what it's like to have (oil and gas crews and facilities) as a neighbor."

This spring, yellow sensors lined Greeley streets as industry "thumper trucks" rolled through the central city conducting seismic tests. These give companies data on just where oil and gas is located beneath buildings and homes.

"The issue is whether neighborhoods can be protected, whether there is anywhere you can live that is going to be free from oil and gas rigs and fracking," said Matt Sura, the Fox Run residents' attorney. "If downtown Greeley is going to be drilled and fracked, ultimately, downtown Denver could be drilled and fracked."

Even if Greeley City Council members were to side with Fox Run residents, it's unclear whether the city could block Mineral Resources' access to oil and gas.

In 1985, Greeley's City Council enacted an ordinance prohibiting drilling. Colorado's Supreme Court in 1992 rejected the city's ban on the basis that it blocked an overriding state interest in oil and gas development.

That case, Voss vs. Lundvall Bros., set the legal precedent that state attorneys are relying on today as they sue Longmont for passing stricter local regulations on drilling. The Colorado Oil and Gas Association also is suing Longmont, challenging a ban on in-town drilling passed by 60 percent of voters. COGA may take legal action against Fort Collins, too, because council members there banned new wells.

Meanwhile, state regulators have been negotiating agreements with local officials in Greeley, Arapahoe County and elsewhere — contracts that buttress the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, not local government, as the primary arbiter of where drilling is done.

A new state buffer zone rule, which takes effect Aug. 1, requires 500-foot setbacks between wells and occupied buildings in urban areas. However, wells can be closer if companies secure written consent from property owners or get special permission from state regulators. Any wells drilled before August could be as close as 350 feet.

Executives at Mineral Resources — which negotiated nearly 10,000 leases in Greeley — say they'll be as delicate as possible in drilling for oil and gas under Fox Run.

They say 95 percent of methane and other air pollution from Mineral Resources wells will be captured to minimize potential harm. A water deal with Greeley lets Mineral Resources draw water from city hydrants, reducing truck traffic.

"The truth on the ground is that Greeley is highly supportive of this," said company land manager Logan Richardson. "We'll only add two more sites — probably a couple hundred wells. They'll be clustered, remote, hidden away. We're very sympathetic to the visual aesthetic. Anywhere we can make adjustments (to accommodate residents), we do it."

Yet, at Fox Run, there's a simmering rage.

"Basically, this is the big guys telling the little guys what is going to happen — big guys from the city and oil companies," said resident Dick Warkentin, a homebuilder living next to where wells would be drilled. "They don't do what the people want. They do what they want because they all have their fingers in it."

The local economy, including homebuilding, recently started to rebound, largely because Greeley is seen as a healthy community, he said. Oil and gas companies "are going to kill it if they start drilling in town."

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